by Iain Pears
Not knowing whether to be pleased or irritated, Bottando went back to his office to try and figure out all the subtleties and, as was his habit, ended up sleeping on it.
It was not the best time for an anonymous tip-off to come in, warning about an imminent raid to steal one of the city’s works of art.
Jonathan Argyll walked home across Rome at half past six in the evening, taking some, but not a great deal, of pleasure in the bustle of a city anxious to get home for its dinner. He was tired. It had been a long day, what with one thing and another. A lecture in the morning, which was becoming routine now that his stage fright had left him and he had gauged the low expectations of the audience, followed by two hours of sitting in the little broom cupboard officially called his office, fending off students in various levels of distress who came to waste his time. Could they be late on this? Could he photocopy that to spare them the trouble of actually sitting in a library themselves?
No, and no. Much to his great surprise, his random career change nine months previously from art dealer to temporary lecturer in baroque studies had brought out a hitherto unsuspected authoritarian side to his character. Combined with a tendency to grumble about what students were like in his day, he had managed to institute a reign of terror for all who were lured into the great mistake of signing up for his course on Roman art and architecture, 1600 to 1750.
The Baroque. The Counter-Reformation. Bernini and Borromini and Maderno and Pozzo. Good lads, all of them. No need for slides or illustrated lectures in this of all cities; just send the idle good-for-nothings on walking tours. On their own on a Monday, escorted by him on a Wednesday. Mens sana in corpore sano. Health and knowledge, all in one package. Cheap at the not inconsiderable price the besotted parents of the little urchins coughed up to add a patina of cultivation to their offspring.
Even more surprisingly, he was quite good at it. His boundless enthusiasm for the more obscure and impenetrable aspects of baroque iconography slowly transferred itself to some of his students. Not many, admittedly; half a dozen out of thirty or so, but this was held by his colleagues to be pretty good going considering the motley collection of raw material they had to work on.
And the great virtue of it all was that he didn’t really have to prepare anything: his only problem was deciding what to leave out. And marking. That was depressing, of course.
“Medieval monks scourged themselves with birch rods; we do the same thing with essays,” the head of his department, a Renaissance man himself, explained in a philosophic vein. “It comes to the same thing in the end. Painful and humiliating, but part of the job. And purifying, in its way: it makes you see the futility of your existence.”
There was, however, a snag. Lurking ambition, somnolent or at least beaten into submission, had been awoken once more by the transition. Old habits and pleasures came back to haunt him. Having taken the job as a temporary measure because of the flaccid state of the art market, Argyll found himself rather liking the business, despite the students. He had even taken out his doctorate, long since forgotten and mouldering on the shelves while he tried to make a living as a dealer, and dusted it off. The itch was upon him once more: the desire to see his name in print. Nothing grand. A little article, with a decent array of footnotes on some minor topic, to get him back into the mood. An excuse for ambling around in the archives. Everybody else was at it; and it was a bit awkward to have lunch with a colleague. What are you working on? It was an inevitable question. It would be pleasant to be able to answer.
What indeed, though? He had been flailing around, trying to come up with something for a couple of months. Nothing, so far, had struck his fancy. Too big, too small or done already. The universal chorus of modern academia. It occupied his mind mightily these days.
Except when there was marking. That was the little nagging detail in the back of his mind which stopped him enjoying the view of Isola Tiburtina as he trudged through the thick fumes of evening carbon monoxide and across the Ponte Garibaldi on his way home. Fifteen essays on Jesuit building programmes. Could have been worse; they might all have managed to pull themselves together and produce something. And judging by the look of it, some of the offerings were going to be a touch thin. In abstract, he loved the conscientious students who worked hard and tried. When he had to mark the result, he loathed the little swots for the reams of paper they produced. But there was nothing to be done about it; a couple of hours of his evening were going to be devoted to reading their efforts, and trying to stay calm when, as was inevitable, one of them informed him that Raphael had been a pope, or that Bernini taught Michelangelo everything he knew about sculpture.
When what he really needed was a nice quiet evening with Flavia, who had promised faithfully to be home early and cook dinner for the first time in weeks. Now that they had, tentatively, decided to recognize reality and get as married in law as they seemed to be in practice, and Argyll had settled into his new job and was no longer fretting continually about his career, life had become as blissful as it could possibly be when you were proposing to link your life’s fortunes to a woman who never knew when her job would allow her to come home.
Not her fault; police work was like that, and she did her best. But it was galling, occasionally, to be so obviously pushed into second place by a purloined chalice, however much a marvel of sixteenth-century Tuscan workmanship it undoubtedly was. All very well, once in a while. But these things kept on vanishing. The thieves never rested. Did they not feel the need for a quiet evening with their feet up now and then like everyone else?
This time, Flavia would be home; she had left a message to that effect not half an hour ago, and Argyll was looking forward to it; he had even done his duty and got all the shopping on the way home so they could have a properly civilized meal together. He was so much looking forward to it that he felt a little anticipatory skip as he turned into the vicolo di Cedro, and began the last stage of the journey home.
And met Flavia coming down the street. She gave him a quick kiss, and looked apologetic.
“You’re going back to the office, aren’t you?”’ he said accusingly. “I know that look.”
“‘Fraid so. Just for a while. I won’t be long.”
“Oh, Flavia. You promised …”
“Don’t worry. I won’t be long.”
“Yes, you will be.”
“Jonathan. There’s nothing I can do. Something’s come up. It really won’t take a long time. There’s a little problem.”
He scowled, his good mood evaporating.
“I’ll go and do my marking, then.”
“Good idea. And I’ll be back by the time you’re finished. Then we can have a quiet evening together.”
Grumbling to himself about essays, Argyll mounted the stairs to the third floor, said good evening to the old signora on the first floor and nodded coolly but politely to Bruno, the young lad with a taste for filling the night air with very loud and extremely bad music on the second, before fumbling in his pocket for his keys. Odd, he thought. There was a very strong inverse relationship between the volume of music and its quality. He’d never noticed it when he was young.
Two hours later, he’d finished his marking; Flavia had not yet returned. Three hours later, he’d eaten his dinner and she was still not there. Four hours later he went to bed.
“When did this come in?”’ Flavia asked incredulously when she got back to the office and saw the slip of paper containing a brief summary of the anonymous phone call.
The office trainee, a young, fresh-faced girl called Giulia who looked as though she should still be doing her homework before washing up for her mother, blushed with distress. It was hardly her fault; the call had come in, and there was no one to tell. She said as much.
“About five. But you weren’t here, and I did go up to the General’s office.”
“And what did he say?”’
“Well, nothing,” she said reluctantly. “He was asleep.”
“And you didn’
t want to wake him because you’re new here and don’t know that it is quite acceptable to give him a prod. I know. Don’t get upset. It’s not your fault.”
She sighed. Being just and fair is hard sometimes. It would have been much more satisfactory if she could have shouted at the girl.
“OK. Let’s forget about that now. Did you take the call?”’
The infant nodded, realizing that the worst was over. “It was very imprecise.”
“No code-words? Not one of our regulars?”’
“No. Just that there was going to be an important raid in the next few days. On this monastery, or whatever it is. San Giovanni.”
“What do they have? Are they on our list? Have you checked the computer?”’
She nodded again, grateful that she had done the basics. “They were burgled a couple of years ago, and were put on the register then.” She pulled out a piece of paper the computer had disgorged an hour ago.
“In fact, they have very little. Quite a lot of gold and silver ornaments, but that is mainly kept in a bank safe deposit; General Bottando recommended that after the last time. The only thing on the list which would seem to be worth anything is a painting by Caravaggio. Which is an important painting, although according to the book, not one of his best. And according to another book, isn’t by Caravaggio at all.”
“Insured?”’
“No note of it here.”
Flavia looked at her watch. Damn. Jonathan would not be pleased. She could see his point. It was some time …
“Have you rung them?”’
“No answer.”
“Where is this place?”’
“On the Aventino.”
“I suppose I’d better go there on my way home,” Flavia said reluctantly. “Just to tell them to lock up carefully. Do we have anyone who can watch the place?”’
Giulia shook her head. “No one except me.”
“You’re minding the desk. Oh, I’ll see what I can do. If you’d get some patrol cars to drive past the place periodically during the night. And while you’re sitting here drinking coffee all night, go through all the lists of coming and goings and sightings and arrivals. Anything at all. OK?”’
Father Xavier, still at his desk and attending to the business generated by meetings, received Flavia in his office without ceremony and listened to what she had to say quietly.
“You must get reports like this all the time, don’t you?”’
She shrugged. “A reasonable number, but rarely this specific. It would be foolish to disregard it. I thought it would be best to let you know so you could be on alert. Probably nothing will happen, but if you could put that painting into safe storage for a while …”
Father Xavier smiled indulgently. “I don’t think so. And I’m also sure that if any thief saw it at the moment, he would change his mind quite quickly.”
“Why’s that?”’
“It’s being restored. By an American gentleman, called Daniel Menzies. Who is doing a very thorough job of it, I must say. He tells me that people who know nothing about the restoration process are always frightened at this stage of proceedings, and no doubt he knows what he is doing, but it is in a very poor state indeed at the moment. He has removed the old canvas, large portions of what he says is nineteenth-century paintwork and a good deal of grime. As far as I can see, there is nothing left at all for any thief to steal.”
“And is there anything else?”’
There was a slight hesitation as the priest thought, then shook his head. “We have many things of value to us; nothing of any great value to anyone else. You are aware that we were burgled?”’
Flavia nodded.
“A bitter lesson,” he continued. “We had always maintained a policy of leaving the church open on to the street. There is a street entrance, as well as one from the cloister. Some local inhabitants always preferred it to the parish church. It was a mistake, as we discovered. Since then, the door has been firmly locked. It was one of the first things I had to contend with when I took over as superior. The only other way in is through the courtyard, and the door on to that is locked as well.”
“Alarms?”’
“No. There are limits. It was considered unseemly that we should defend ourselves in such a fashion. I didn’t agree, but that was the decision of the council who have the last word in such matters.”
She stood up. “It may have been a hoax. But I thought it was wise …”
He nodded, stood up to show her out and shook her hand. “It was very kind of you, signorina. Very kind indeed, especially at such a late hour. And I will make sure that all precautions are taken.”
And Flavia, finally, felt her day was coming to an end. On her way back, she called in to Giulia, to see if anything else had happened. She shouldn’t, she knew. There is nothing worse than an interfering superior, constantly meddling and looking over your shoulder. It does no good at all, and merely makes you uncertain of yourself. She remembered that from her own youth. But she felt uncomfortable.
“Anything?”’
“No. I’ve been going through the lists. Airports, hotels, sightings at railway stations, reports from dealers. Nothing of importance.”
“What about the unimportant?”’
“Not much there, either. The only thing I did note was that someone vaguely involved in one of your cases last year arrived yesterday evening. Just a witness, though: no involvement in anything illegal. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
“Who?”’
“A woman called Verney. Mary Verney.”
Flavia got that little turning sensation in her stomach that always happened when she realized that, if disaster was going to be averted, it would be by sheer good fortune rather than skill or observation or intelligence.
“Some report you wrote seems to have been absorbed into the immigration computer. I don’t know why. It just came up as routine.”
“Any idea where she is?”’
“No. But I can try and find out, if you think it’s important.”
“I do. I really do. Think of it as your night-time’s entertainment. Ring round every hotel in Rome if need be. The sooner you find her, the better.”
“Who is she?”’
“An old friend. And a very clever woman. You’ll like her.”
“Ah, yes. Mary Verney,” Bottando said the next morning. “The English country lady. Why are you so interested in her? All she did was provide evidence against that man Forster last year. So you told me. Or was there more to it?”’
“We got back eighteen pictures, thanks to her,” Flavia said. She didn’t like this bit. “And because of that I was happy to end the enquiry. Getting things back is our main job, after all. But once all the reports were written and the whole affair finished I became convinced she was responsible for most of the thefts in the first place.”
“And you never mentioned this?”’ Bottando said with a suggestion of slight surprise around the left eyebrow. She avoided looking too embarrassed.
“I couldn’t pin anything on her, and if I’d tried earlier we would never have recovered the pictures. It was a trade-off and, in the circumstances, a reasonable one.”
Bottando nodded. It was, after all, exactly what he would have done himself. He couldn’t complain too much.
“But she’s on the loose? A bit unwise, that, don’t you think?”’
“Unexpected. She’s not so young any more, and I was pretty sure she’d retired. She’s no spring chicken, you know. And hardly needs the money.”
Bottando nodded. For some reason Flavia got the idea he was only half listening.
“But here she is,” he observed. “You want to bring her in?”’
Flavia shook her head. “No. It may be a completely innocent visit, and it would be a waste of time. I don’t want to start anything official unless we have to explain our interest. But I don’t like her being in Rome. I thought it would be a good idea to let her know that we are aware she’s here. I’ll have her for a
drink. It would accomplish the same thing. She’s staying in the Borgognoni hotel. With your permission, I’ll ring her up this morning. And put someone on to watch her.”
Bottando came out of his reverie long enough to frown with disapproval. “We can’t afford that. Don’t have the people. Besides, this monastery business seems a higher priority. If either of them is.”
“Well …”
“No. You can have Giulia. Time she got out of the office, and we can put the cost down to the ministry’s training budget. A bit of practice for her. But that’s all. Get her to stand outside San Giovanni all day …”
“She’s already there.”
Bottando peered at her. “Oh,” he said. “Good. You can have her follow this Verney woman afterwards, for a bit of variety, if you like. Couple of days of that and she’ll begin to realize what policing is really all about. But don’t use anyone else.”
He was right, she knew that; they couldn’t spare two people. Even sending Giulia out would mean masses of extra paperwork for everyone else. But the very presence of Mary Verney in Rome rattled her. She nodded, nonetheless.
Bottando grunted. “Good. Now, is there anything else? Thank you,” he said to his secretary as she slid into the room and deposited a vast file on his desk. He transferred it immediately to a drawer, which he closed with a satisfying slam. “Because if not, I’m going for a coffee.”
She stopped and looked carefully at him. “You all right?”’ she asked. “You don’t seem your normal self at all this morning. Did they give you food poisoning or something yesterday?”’
He grimaced, and hesitated, and then gave into the temptation. “Come back in and sit down. I need to tell you something,” he said with a sigh.
“Sounds bad,” she said as she settled back on the armchair.
“Maybe, maybe not. I haven’t figured it out yet. I’m being promoted. I think.”
